


Descent

by Morgyn Leri (morgynleri)



Series: In the Silence and the Dark [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Depersonalization, Don’t copy to another site, Force Feeding, GFY, Gen, Isolation, Psychological Torture, Starvation, Torture, mental manipulation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-20
Updated: 2019-01-20
Packaged: 2019-10-13 01:41:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17478848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morgynleri/pseuds/Morgyn%20Leri
Summary: Qui-Gon is taken by a Sith Lord whose greatest interest in the Jedi lies in breaking him, and in doing, gaining a new Apprentice.





	Descent

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Poplitealqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Poplitealqueen/gifts).



> This is a story about the breakdown of Qui-Gon Jinn by a Sith. It involves torture and abuse, and the last bit could readily be construed as a form of mental rape. If the particular things in the tags are a trigger or a squick for you, I would recommend skipping this in favor of the second story in the AU.

The Jedi kneels on the floor of the cargo hold of the old ship, looking for all the galaxy as if he's meditating. Trying to, anyway. Joru knows he can't reach the Force for a full Jedi meditation. It amuses him to see the Jedi trying so hard for serenity, when it had been his emotions that had caught Joru's attention on Mandalore. Not as volatile, perhaps, as those of the children with him, but they're children, and Joru finds children boring when they're not irritating.

Joru smiles to himself, sharpened teeth pricking at his lips, and turns away for now. There will be time enough to play with the Jedi when they're safely hidden away where neither the Jedi nor Joru's own line-descendents can find them. Especially not the other Sith. Joru hisses quietly at the thought of what his line has become, and what they have forsaken in the process.

Still, that is correctable, when he has sufficient tools to do so. He had thought to recruit some of the Mandalorians this time, but this. This is so much more a prize than he'd expected to return home with.

Ducking into the cockpit, he checks the controls as he settles into the pilot's seat. Another four hours should see them safely at the forgotten little moon he's spent the last century reshaping to suit his desires. Then, he can begin to work on the Jedi.

* * *

The room he wakes in this time does not have the hum of ship engines moving through the floor, nor any sign of a door. Walls curve into the ceiling, high over his head, and the floor slopes gently to the center where he is. Chilled, damp, without clothes or the Force.

Qui-Gon sits up carefully, then stands, turning so he can look at more of the room than he had seen in his first glimpse. There is a small opening in one wall, damp gleaming beneath it in the low light, though the water that flows from it makes only the faintest of sounds. The light itself is coming from a very small opening in the center of the ceiling.

"Good morning, Jedi." The voice comes from the same source as the light, and a moment later, the light itself flickers, someone passing between the opening and the actual light source. "Welcome to your new home. Are you hungry?"

He doesn't know when the last time he ate was, and Qui-Gon is uncomfortably aware that he is, indeed, hungry, but he hesitates to say as much. Not when he isn't certain who his captor is, or where they are, or if he truly is alone here.

"Where is my Padawan?" He hopes Obi-Wan was able to escape, and keep the Duchess safe, but there is no certainty as he would have if the Force were still present. If the bond were anything but an aching absence in the back of his mind.

"I do not know, nor do I much care. Dead, perhaps, with a foolish young thing to protect and no Master to guide him."

His captor sounds entirely indifferent, and Qui-Gon closes his eyes a moment, taking a breath in an attempt to center himself.

"Are you hungry, Jedi?"

There is no reason to deny it, and starve himself of energy needed more for escape than defiance. "Yes."

"Good."

The light vanishes a moment later, leaving him in absolute darkness, and without any sign that food will be given to him at all.

How long he waits, patiently sitting at the center of the floor, before the light returns he doesn't know. His captor doesn't speak this time, though after a brief moment, something comes oozing from the opening, dropping heavily into the hands Qui-Gon hastily cups to catch it. Whatever it is has no smell, a slightly gritty texture, and feels cool against his hands. When he touches the tip of his tongue to it, there is no flavor he can discern, and nothing to make his instincts scream of danger.

He doesn't have a chance to lick all of the half-liquid mass off his hands before the light vanishes again. Not enough to keep him from feeling hungry, only enough to sharpen his appetite.

Following the water to its source takes time, and it takes long moments to fill his cupped hands with enough to bring it to his mouth to drink. The water itself has a slightly bitter taste to it, and he grimaces even as he forces himself to swallow. It doesn't settle well, but it doesn't threaten to come back up, at least.

It takes longer to manage to wash the residue of the food off his hands, and then there is nothing once more. Just the darkness and his own thoughts and the faintest trick of water that quickly fades into the background of his own rushing blood.

He settles into a meditation pose in the center of the room once more, hoping to at least manage to settle his mind even without the presence of the Force. All he can do now is wait. Sooner or later, the Jedi will find him.

* * *

Joru lets himself feel the growing apprehension of the Jedi as he does his own meditations on the thick carpet he has on the floor of the room. It hides the hairline seam around the stone plug and the borehole in the center of that, and keeps the Jedi in darkness and silence. It's taken longer than he likes to feel the beginning of fear, but he has all the time he wants to do this. The Jedi may perhaps be beginning to realize that.

Standing, he goes to the pipe that leads down to the cell itself, trickling water into the stone room. Time to begin another little piece of fun. He picks up the device waiting near the pipe, and wraps it around the metal before flipping it on.

He can feel the moment the Jedi receives the first shock from the water, a burst of static across whatever of him is in contact with it. Joru smiles, and returns to the rug, settling on it once more to meditate.

* * *

The water isn't constantly electrified, nor can he discern a pattern to it, and for all that he tries not to let it effect him, Qui-Gon knows it is. He cannot make himself reach for the water without hesitating, or at least flinching. It is the only thing he can be certain he's getting enough of, and now he is beginning to fear trying to get any at all.

How long after that something else changes, he can't tell. It's not much, but the temperature drops just enough that he cannot stay warm if he stays still. There is more water now, but he still cannot stop flinching - and with good reason, as it still is electrified at irregular intervals.

When he sleeps, he wakes cold, or is shocked awake when he rolls to the center of the room and the water is electrified. Nothing more than naps, enough to keep going for a while, but without being able to reach for the Force to replenish his reserves, Qui-Gon knows they won't be enough.

He's not certain how the next torment is introduced to him, whether it is something in the food or the water, but the pain stabs through his joints like vibroknives. The first bright shock of it lasts only seconds, but some of it lingers, like bruises, for what might be days, might be weeks. It makes it harder to sleep at all, even for the naps he'd been able to manage before.

When the light shows again, he can't help but ask, "How much longer do you plan on keeping me here?"

Qui-Gon knows he shouldn't give up on being rescued, but he doesn't know how long he has been here without any sign of anyone but the person who feeds him. It's getting harder to hold onto hope.

"As long as I want to." There's a moment's silence. "Do you want out?"

He bites his lip hard enough to draw blood, remembering what happened when he had confirmed he was hungry after first waking in here.

"Does it matter what I want?"

"It matters what you want, and when you want it."

"So you can deny it to me?" That, he hadn't meant to say at all.

"Of course."

Whoever it is says nothing more, just pours the familiar goop through the hole, and leaves Qui-Gon once more in the dark. He holds the sticky mass in his hands for a moment before letting it slide free, and onto the floor. He knows it is foolish, but he doesn't want to face the pain again. At least if it's something in his food, he'll know this time.

* * *

When the Jedi stops eating, Joru puts a sedative in the water, and lifts the plug of stone free of the floor once he is certain the Jedi is unconscious. Time for a new residence for his toy.

He makes certain the cuffs are just a little too tight to be comfortable, height and position already adjusted so the Jedi can neither stand, nor sit or even comfortably kneel. Crouched, instead, like a disobedient pet.

Then, all he must do is wait.

* * *

The first thing he notices when he wakes this time is that it's no longer cold. It is, even, almost uncomfortably warm. The next thing he notices is he's restrained, and uncomfortably so.

"You do not choose when you eat, and when you do not, Jedi." The voice of his captor is closer than it had been before, and it takes a moment after Qui-Gon opens his eyes to focus on the other person.

A twi'lek, pale blue with sharp-spiked tattoos in a lurid and painful red, and coldly pale eyes that don't seem to have much color at all. Lounging comfortably on a low couch, watching Qui-Gon.

"It got me out of that room." It is a small victory, for all that it's brought him a different sort of hardship. How long it will be before the chains go from uncomfortable to painful, he's uncertain, though Qui-Gon has few doubts the twi'lek will keep him in them long past that point.

"For only as long as I want you to remain out of it." The twi'lek bares his teeth, filed to sharp points, though there is amusement lurking in his eyes. "You eat when I give you food, you live where I keep you."

There are myriad ways to ensure someone cannot starve themselves to death, and Qui-Gon has a bad feeling his captor does not intend to use the kinder means to do so. He cannot let himself merely submit, though. "You cannot force me to eat."

"I can do what I wish, Jedi." The twi'lek stands, moving with a fluid ease that makes Qui-Gon think he has had some of the same training Jedi do. "No one will stop me here, not even you."

He moves to a table, just the right height for him to work at, picking up a small bowl, stone that looks much like the stone of the walls around them. The same stone as the room he'd been in before.

When he comes to stand in front of Qui-Gon, he smiles again, looking down. "You may call me Master."

"I will not." Qui-Gon meets his captor's gaze steadily.

"You will, Jedi. Perhaps not now, but one day you will." The twi'lek lifts his hand, and Qui-Gon can feel icy fingers wrapping around his jaw, pressing painfully into his flesh until he opens his mouth. The contents of the bowl are poured in, and the same icy fingers of Force hold his jaw shut and stop up his nose. "Swallow it, Jedi."

It is the same tasteless, gritty goop as before, and Qui-Gon finds it hard to swallow even though he knows he must. His vision is starting to grey at the edges before he clears his mouth, and he's allowed air once more. Gasping and coughing as his captor takes the bowl back to the table.

When he can control his breathing once more, his captor has returned to the low couch, sitting as if he is settling in to meditate. Not a Jedi, but someone clearly trained in use of the Force. Perhaps once a Jedi, and now lost.

"What is your name?" He will not call his captor master. "I am—"

"You are no one, Jedi. You have no name here unless I grant you one." The twi'lek doesn't open his eyes, breathing slowly and deeply. "You will call me Master. You have not earned the right to call me anything else."

"I have a name."

"You had a name. It is no longer yours."

"Qu—"

Fingers of Force wrap around his throat, cutting him off before he can finish even a single syllable. They seem to burrow beneath his skin, thin threads of ice that work their way through him, leaving him breath, but when he tries to speak, no sound comes from his throat.

"You will speak only when I command you to, Jedi. I do not desire your pointless and idle chatter."

Qui-Gon tries to reach for the Force, even though he has not been able to reach it since he was taken. Even the first niggling aches from how he is crouched in his bonds doesn't worry him as much as the ability of his captor to steal his voice. There is no technique in the Force that Qui-Gon has heard of to do this. Perhaps something a Healer might know, but there is none here to ask.

Only his captor, and he cannot do that if he cannot speak.

* * *

The rising threads of fear that come from the Jedi make Joru smile, basking in them. The longer the Jedi is voiceless, the more he will fear. The longer he feels the pain of his crouching where he has been left, the less he will be able to withstand any other pain Joru desires to inflict on him.

It is invigorating. He has been too long without a project of this sort to hold his attention, and Joru makes a note to perhaps find another when he has properly broken this one to his hand.

* * *

He doesn't know how long he is in chains, in a room where the light never faltered, never changed. The only measure of time is when his captor meditates, when he feeds Qui-Gon, when he allows him water, when he allows him to relieve himself into a chamberpot.

When he allows Qui-Gon to stand, muscles cramping and struggling to hold him upright. Never to lay down, never to have that much comfort. Barely allowed to sleep, and even when he is, he can never sleep well, crouched as he is, with every joint and muscle aching at best.

Sometimes he would activate some mechanism that Qui-Gon can't see, sending electricity darting along his nerves, leaving him twitching and unable to keep his emotions under as much control as he would prefer. Uncertainty is a constant companion, and fear rarely far away.

When he slips into sleep swiftly after eating - he doesn't bother trying to fight it, preferring to save his strength for when he's given a chance to stand - Qui-Gon wonders where he will wake this time.

He's not sure if it is an improvement on his captivity to be once more in the first room, in the dark and the damp and the chill, or not. At least here he can move freely.

Qui-Gon tries to speak, hoping perhaps this move also means he is given his voice back, but still nothing emerges. No voice until and unless his captor allows him to speak.

After that, time begins to blur. Back and forth between the lack of sensation in one room, and the overabundance of it in the other. Never allowed to speak, never addressed by his name - he is only Jedi. Sometimes he forgets he has any other name, and it takes him longer to remind himself that he does have a name. To remind himself that there is something beyond this endless captivity, that someone must be searching for him, will find him.

When he wakes on a cot, instead of stone or crouched in chains, he startles, trying to roll off and away. He can't move, though, and he hears a quiet laugh. The twi'lek again, the master of this place.

"I had you washed, pet. You were filthy. Rest."

Darkness washes over his vision, and though he fights not to fall back into sleep, it drags him under. He's still on the cot when he wakes later, though now he can move. Something feels different, though it takes him a while to realize what it is.

His skin feels tight in places, itching like it's healing, and tender. And he can move, can roll off the bed, and stand on the stone floor. It's cold, almost icy under his feet, and the air holds a chill not entirely unlike the dark room. There is light here, though. A door, that he doesn't even bother to try to open - it will be locked.

There is nothing in the room beyond the cot, with its thin mattress and no blankets, and a light panel that is seamlessly integrated into the wall, fused to the stone to prevent access. No access to water or food, even the pellets or goop he'd come to expect.

He sits on the cot, watching the door, and waiting for any sign of the twi'lek. How long he waits, he doesn't know - the light never dims, never brightens, never changes, and nothing else in the room does either. All he can do is wait and count his breaths, his heartbeats. Eventually, he begins to pace, just for something to do, counting his steps from wall to wall. It doesn't soothe the agitation, the niggling maybe-fear that claws at the back of his mind.

Nothing changes before he passes out, curled up on the cot and facing the door, and nothing has changed when he wakes again. He repeats the same cycle three times before he tries the door even though he's certain it will be locked. Except it isn't, and he stares a moment at it, and the bit it's shifted.

When he pulls it open fully, there is nothing outside but yawning darkness. Even the light from the room doesn't go beyond the door frame more than a few inches. A draft comes through it, icy cold that makes him shiver before he closes the door again. Without knowing how far it is through the cold, he can't go out there.

Yet, if he stays, he will starve, or die of dehydration. Perhaps should have already.

He paces the room until he passes out once more, hoping perhaps there will be something different when he wakes this time.

Luck is not with him.

Taking a deep breath, he opens the door again, looking out into the darkness. Trying to decide which direction to go. He leaves the door open behind him, to be a light to guide him back if he can't find anything out there.

There's nothing to see, even once his eyes adjust to the dark, and all he can do is slowly shuffle his way forward, looking over his shoulder periodically to make sure he can still see the light of the room. He's not sure what it is he's walking on, other than something cold. Not sure if he'll find anything.

No time, nothing but the darkness and the dwindling point of light, and the cold. He's not even sure how far he goes before he stops, turning back to look at the light. Trying to decide if he'd rather go back to the warmth and the light and starve there, or die faster out here, from the cold.

Dropping to his knees, he takes a deep, shuddering breath. Staring at the light, his hands resting on his thighs, for a long moment before he closes them. Trying to listen for anything from the Force. Any sign that he should go back or remain where he is.

Silence.

He takes another shuddering breath, splaying his fingers out over his knees a moment, and opens his eyes. Staring at the light in the distance without moving. What does it matter if he dies here or there when he cannot even reach the Force?

Closing his eyes again, he waits for the cold to do its work.

* * *

Smiling to himself, Joru steps away from the couch, feeling the despair and resignation that radiates from the Jedi. No. Not a Jedi, not any longer. His Apprentice.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted in four parts on Tumblr, 13 October 2016-19 January 2017.


End file.
